Wednesday, June 8, 2011

Wisconsin narrowly opposes gay marriage

Though voters nationwide are trending in favor of legal gay marriage, Wisconsinites still oppose it by a slight margin with 42% in favor of legal gay marriage and 46% opposed. Support for legal gay marriage is a bit lower than in neighboring Minnesota where it is neck and neck at +1(46/45). This narrow margin in Wisconsin stands in contrast to results from 2006 in which Wisconsin voted to ban both gay marriage and civil unions by a solid 19 points. There is both a large age and gender gap on the issue in Wisconsin. Those 18-29 support legal gay marriage +21(58/37) while those older than 65 are in opposition -25(30/55). Women support legal gay marriage +12(49-37) compared to strong opposition from men -21(34/55)

Retiring Democratic Senator Herb Kohl is seeing a bit of a retirement bump with a strong 56% approval rating and only 29% disapproval. This is up from his +20(50/30) rating in March.

As more voters get to know him, freshman Republican Senator Ron Johnson is holding relatively steady with a 35% approval rating and 33% disapproval. This is similar to the +4(32/28) ratings Johnson received in March. Johnson’s ratings are fairly polarized with Republicans approving +62(69/7) and Democrats disapproving -55(7/62).

Voters in his home state are no more enamored with new RNC chairman Reince Priebus than Marylanders are with Michael Steele. 11% view Priebus favorably and 21% unfavorably, though most do not venture an opinion. He is seen favorably within his own party though +12(22/10).
Full results here

You are delusional if you really think that only 46% of Wisconsinites oppose gay marriage when nearly 60% voted to ban both gay marriage and civil unions just 4 years ago. Either you need to find a better way to poll this question, or not ask it at all, because it had been proven that there is a huge "Bradley Effect" when it pertains to polling questions such as this one.

I live in Massachusetts and doubt that even a majority there support it.

Yes, I'm about to complain about something I was able to view for free, but really, this was all the miscellany you could fit in? What about the Voter ID bill? The concealed carry proposals? The Supreme Court race?

"This of course likely means that Wisconsinites probably oppose gay marriage by a substantial majority because there are so many 'undecideds'."

That doesn't follow at all.

"it had been proven that there is a huge "Bradley Effect" when it pertains to polling questions such as this one."

Actually, our polling on the issue in Maine before they banned it was dead on. Automated polling eliminates the social desirability bias much more than live interviewer polls do, meaning people are more likely to admit bias against various minorities, which is why our polls on the issue tend to show significantly fewer people in support of gay marriage than outfits like Gallup and the various media polls which have been finding majorities in favor. Also, Wisconsin's vote was 5 years ago, and opinion is moving pretty rapidly toward equality.

"Although I suppose the survey was lengthy already."

That it was. I also don't think that many people outside WI care about those other issues.

Gotta love my home state that I'm moving back to in the very near future for a while. Its the first state to ban discrimination against sexual orientation but I'm willing to bet it will be one of the last states to repeal its marriage amendment.

@Anonymous #1: It's not surprising that voters' views have changed so rapidly when you look at the broader trends that have been supported by countless other polls and analyses. And the poll released yesterday should give you no reason to doubt that Massachusetts strongly supports same-sex marriage...

Thanks so so much for continuing to poll same-sex marriage in new states!!! It's greatly appreciated and it's fascinating to see the all of these state-by-state numbers compared to national trends, since there is obviously a ton of variability between states and no one else does statewide polling!

The so-called "Bradley effect" in gay marriage polling has been in steady decline. And PPP has always had the smallest variance of the pollsters polling on this issue.

Although I am sure that most of those undecideds would break against gay marriage, it is highly unlikely that all of them would. If we assume that WI has experienced the same trends as every other state and at no greater or lesser pace, and working off of the 2006 election* results then the "real" breakdown should be something in the neighborhood of 47-48 percent support SSM and 53-54 percent oppose SSM.

*One last point: the 2006 election results in WI are unusual to say the least. A 59% vote to ban SSM puts WI opposition just a few points below that of Idaho, a super-red state, which passed an amendment in 2006 w/ 63% of the vote.

In 2006, AZ defeated an anti-gay marriage amendment 51-49, because it, like WI's amendment, attempted to ban civil unions as well. It seems extremely odd that WI would run 9 percentage points more conservative than AZ. Whether this is because of WI's historically low off-year turnout or because of an inept campaign by the SSM supporters, I do not know.

"I also don't think that many people outside WI care about those other issues."

I suppose that's fair enough. But at the same time, when you have the DNC chairwoman saying Voter ID laws are similar to Jim Crow laws, I think it would have been interesting to see what the citizens of a state that is actually seeing such a bill enacted think.

(A SurveyUSA poll of Minnesota found residents there overwhelmingly in favor).